Harmonising and reinforcing the fight against fraud across the EU: crosscutting anti-fraud policies, measures and results in 2018

• Author: European Anti-Fraud Office (European Commission)
• Pages: 17-27

17

th Annual Report on the Protection of the European Union’s financial interests — Fight against fraud 

. Harmonising and reinforcing

the fight against fraud across

the EU: crosscutting anti-fraud

policies, measures and results

in 

.. Legislative acts adopted by the EU institutions

... Regulation implementing enhanced cooperation on t he

establishment of EPPO : state of play

Following the a doption of the EP PO regulati on, in August 2018, t he Netherla nds and

Malta conf‌ir med their membership to t he EPPO, bringing the tot al number of particip ating

Member States t o 22. The EPP O will be competent t o investigate, prosecute a nd bring to

judgment crim inal of‌fences af‌fecti ng EU’s f‌inancial inter ests as def‌ined in t he PIF Directive.

The EPPO is ex pected to be o perational by th e end of 2020, following a s etting up pe-

riod of at least 3 year s provided for in th e EPPO Regulat ion. Esta blishing the EPP O is a

Commission prior ity and this process is well adva nced.

In 2018, the Commissio n appointed a n interim Administ rative Direct or, responsible for

the administr ative and budg etary matt ers. The proce dures for the rec ruitment of th e

European Chi ef Prosecutor a nd of the Europea n Prosecutor s were also laun ched. The

Commission invit ed Member States t o nominate their c andidates for the p osition of

European Pro secutor by the end of March 2019.

The part icipating Member States are b eing consulted througho ut the process through t he

group of exper ts that was set up in accord ance with the EPPO Regu lation.

... The Omnibus Regulat ion

Regulation (E U, Euratom) 2018/104 6, the ‘Omnibus r egulation’, was ado pted on 18 July

2018. The Omnibu s regulation a mends the exist ing Financial Re gulation whic h sets out

the overall fram ework for budget man agement, as w ell as a number of ac ts governing

the EU’s multia nnual programmes in va rious f‌ields, including c ohesion policy. The Omn ibus

regulation t herefore revises the EU ’s f‌inancial rules to simpl ify them and make them mo re

result-oriente d. It includes r evisions that simpli fy the use of f‌inan cial instrume nts under

the Europea n Structural and Invest ment Funds.

Article 61 of th e Financial Regulation re def‌ines conf‌lict of inter ests for all f‌inancial act ors

implementing the EU budget in the various management modes, including at national

level. This is likely to e ngender a large increase in t he use of “declarations of interes t” by

f‌inancial ac tors, an increase of tran sparency, and better publ ic conf‌idence.

.. Shaping the future: European institutions’ legislative and

policy initiatives

The next se ction gives an overview of major d evelopments in Commission po licy and leg-

islative initiat ives in 2018.